By James Costello Sports Editor
SOUTH BEND — Follow-ing their program-first semistate championship run last season, the Lady Eagles had high hopes for the 2009 tournament.
Last year the road to the final four went through South Bend St. Joseph’s, but when the regional rivals met again Wednesday it was the Indians who came out on top, ending Culver Girls Academy’s hopes of a repeat Riley Regional title with a 2-1 win at Jackson Middle School in South Bend.
“Certainly it’s nice to get a win against a team that beat you last year,” said St. Joe head coach Johan Kuitse. “They ended your season last year, so you have a chance to end their season. Yeah, it’s nice, but in terms of anything special you just want to practice tomorrow, you want to play Saturday, and pretty or not pretty, it counts.”

“Honestly, all over the field they were just a little bit of a step ahead of us,” said CGA coach Nathaniel King. “We didn’t really get going in our game. It took some of them to be a bit aggressive with us for us to really get going in our game. It’s disappointing that I thought we never really got into our rhythm in terms of playing and passing in the field. It’s a tough way to lose, but I do think South Bend St. Joe, they did have a game plan and it worked for them. They didn’t allow us to play and give us any time on the ball. We weren’t really ever able to penetrate.”
Wednesday’s contest between the Eagles and the Indians — ranked 17th and fourth, respectively on Hoosier Futbol.com heading into the match-up — was not only a rematch of last year’s regional championship, but a regular-season game Oct. 7 that ended in a 1-1 draw.
In that earlier meeting it was Culver which struck first, holding onto the 1-0 lead until St. Joe outside mid Karen Liddell evened it up with under a minute and a half to play. In a near-complete reversal Wednesday, Lidell drew first blood on a low drive into the far corner after breaking away on a long free kick from fellow senior Courtney Ponsler early in the 35th minute.
Neither team scored again until St. Joe’s Catherine Raster netted an insurance goal in the 52nd minute, a hard roller that took a bad hop over diving Eagles keeper Jasmine Solola. CGA attacking mid Dineo Mmutla put her team on the board on a free kick from just off the right corner of the penalty box, but it was too little, too late as the Indians held off the defending champs for the remaining eight minutes of play.
“In the final balance the second one was huge,” said Kuitse. “I thought we had a couple things again in front of the goal where we should’ve gotten ourselves a third one to really put it away, because they’re a dangerous team. But getting the first one in a game like this is so important. We’ve given up more than one goal in only two games, so when we got the two goals we thought ‘OK, we may give up one, and it’ll get interesting,’ but we don’t give up two too many times, and it worked out for us again.”
In what was likely one of the biggest plays at the game, St. Joe defender Ryan Dunham was carded for a smart foul that prevented a probable tying goal from Kylee Shipley with 5:03 to go in the first half.
Shipley started a run from half field, battling Dunham neck-in-neck until she began to break away from around 30 yards out, but Dunham tripped her up from behind, sending the junior forward sprawling and spoiling a potential one-on-one situation with Indians goalie Melissa Kuhar.
Dunham received a yellow card for the foul, but it turned out to be well worth it in light of the close final margin.
“I don’t think Ryan tried to trip her, I think she ran across wide and their feet got tangled,” said Kuitse. “I don’t think it was an intentional foul. And I think Nate (King) would say it. If it was a professional foul, it should’ve been a red. If he judged that she purposely tried to prevent her from having a run at the goal it should’ve been a red, and I think he judged that she wasn’t purposely trying to take her out.”
While St. Joe moves on to Crown Point Semistate Saturday, CGA ends its season at a strong 14-4-2. It was a season in which the team was not only adjusting to the stewardship of a first-year head coach King, but also trying to find its own identity in the wake of the groundbreaking 2008 campaign.
“From the beginning of the season, the team came in with high expectations, which is good, but I tried to kind of move away from the shadow of last year’s team,” said King. “It’s easy to look to state, but it’s a long way away. You have to win each game. I’m happy with how things went, but the disappointing thing more than anything is we weren’t able to get into our rhythm for this game, so I think it’s kind of like a question mark. What if?
“I’m still proud of our girls. I think they did really well. I think we should keep our heads up high, and focus on next season now. We lost to a good team today.”

• ST. JOSEPH’S 2,  CULVER GIRLS ACADEMY 1
At South Bend Riley Girls Soccer Regional
First half
SJ — Karen Liddell (Courtney Ponsler), 35th minute
Second half
SJ — Catherine Raster (Ryan Durham), 52nd minute
CGA — Dineo Mmutla (free kick), 72nd minute
Shots on goal: CGA 3, St. Joe 6
Saves: Jasmine Solola (CGA) 2, Melissa Kuhar (SJ) 2
Corner kicks: CGA 0, St. Joe 0
Records: St. Joseph’s 19-1-1, CGA 14-4-2 (final)